AS IT HAPPENED: Day 16 of the Panayiotou trial

Christopher Panayiotou will spend his 30th birthday at the Eastern Cape High Court as day 16 of the Panayiotou trial gets underway.

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23:37

02 Nov 12:22

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Court is adjourned.

02 Nov 12:22

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Chetty: Court is adjourned until 09.30am tomorrow morning.

02 Nov 12:22

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MS: It is the intention that we will call other witnesses in the interim, and resume with the cross examination of Bekker next week Monday.

02 Nov 12:19

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MS: It is envisaged that she will use this evidence and incorporate it into her final report this afternoon and that this will be made available to the defence tomorrow.

02 Nov 12:17

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MS: To clarify, our cellphone expert Tereza Botha has been waiting on evidence submitted to the court. She has been waiting for the conclusion of the evidence being led by Mr Bekker.

02 Nov 12:16

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TP: We understand that the state is busy finalising their cellphone analysis and will need the afternoon to finalise.

02 Nov 12:15

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TP: If we can ask that Mr Bekker can stand down till next week Monday.

Bekker has been on the stand for 3 days.

02 Nov 12:14

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MS: Thank you. I have no further questions for the witness.

I am happy to place on record that I accept that Mr Bekker is under cross examination.

02 Nov 12:14

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MS: And lastly, move to point U.

PB: 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th no points.

On the 13th a number of points recorded.

On the 14th-22nd, no point.

02 Nov 12:11

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MS: I now want to go to point T, the address in Mnasi street.

PB: 9th and 10th - nothing

11th - a number of points

12th - 3 points

13th - nothing

14th - a number of points

15th-23rd - nothing

02 Nov 12:09

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PB: There was one 02:10.02, as well as 02:27:39.

02 Nov 12:08

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No points from 16th-21st.

MS: I am interested in the early hours of the morning on the 22nd.

PB: There were 2 points recorded.

02 Nov 12:08

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PB: On the 15th again a point recorded at 21:01:34.

02 Nov 12:07

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MS: I'm really intrested in the 14th.

PB: On the 14th there were waypoints recorded at the premises.

MS: I need to get on record the time of those waypoints.

PB: The first recorded was at 11:37:02

The second was at 11:37:29

The 11:37:29 is the one closest to the house.

02 Nov 12:06

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PB: On the 9th of April, no points recorded, only in the vicinity of the point itself.

10th - no points.

11th - only in the vicinity of the point.

Same with the 12th only in the vicinity as on the 13th.

02 Nov 12:05

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MS: I want to take you to point S, which is the residence of Siyoni. Can you break it up day by day?

02 Nov 12:04

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MS: We move to the 11th of April.

PB: A few waypoints recorded. On the 12th quite a number recorded. Same on the 13th of April, 14th as well as on the 15th. On the 16th only one waypoint recorded. On the 17th a number were recorded. The same with the 18th, the 19th and the 20th. And on the 21st and the 22nd there were also a number recorded.

02 Nov 12:02

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PB: From this it is quite possible that the vehicle was parked inside the yard.

MS: Before we go to 11 April, were you also asked to determine which place was the longest ignition off area.

PB: Point N (Vumazonkes home) is definitely the longest period where the ignition off was recorded.

MS: In laymans terms.. the longest where the vehicle remained parked was at point N?

PB: Yes, and mostly overnight.

02 Nov 12:01

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PB: On the 9th there are no records. On the 10th quite a number of points were recorded.

The moment that a waypoint is off the road, it may mean incorrect data or some other cause. This is also part of the checks and balances we use.

Calls up photo believed to be Vumazonkes home. Shows a house with a large yard.

02 Nov 12:00

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PB: Yes. All the points were loaded into the software.

If we zoom in, these are all the waypoints that were recorded at point N.

Screen shows a cluster of points overlapping on the screen.

MS: Is it possible to break it down?

02 Nov 11:57

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MS: Now you have also determined fixed point, Exhibit N. The state will show that this was the residential address of Vumazonke.

Is it possible to indicate the frequency of visits to point N?

02 Nov 11:56

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PB: I was very fortunate that when I made observations at the crime scene a U turn was made and this was reflected in this data set.

The excel spreadsheet was also provided in a PDF format and I compared the two documents and they correlated. The raw data, the excel spreadsheet runs from 9 April to 23 April.

02 Nov 11:52

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PB: I then checked if the address that is recorded in one of the columns corresponded with the fixed points that I had recorded myself.

I was very fortunate that when I made observations at the crime scene, a U-turn was made and this was reflected in this data set.

02 Nov 11:52

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PB: The report itself was in excel and the brand logo, company letterhead was also on the document.

I then looked at the data I was going to be using, dates times, latitude and longitude and checked that it was in the right format.

I then checked if there was any absent data, where data should have been recorded.

02 Nov 11:50

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MS: I want to know - a lot of your evidence yesterday and this morning relates to waypoints.

Are there methods, checks and balances that you use to ensure accuracy?

PB: Yes. Data that is received from upload source, is always dealt with with a bit of caution. The first is to determine the source. I received this data from an email from the company, CarTrack.

02 Nov 11:50

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PB: On photo album A1, slide 8, the track runs from A1 to A2.

In order to compare tyre track to tyre you need unique characteristics to the tyre. As is visible here, it veered off stones into soft sand.

Nowhere was there enough unique characteristics to make the comparison.

02 Nov 11:49

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PB: One aspect, while we are here, that I did not cover sufficiently during the crime scene itself.

MS: You said there was 16m of tyre track at the crime scene.

MS: What was it that made it that the tyre track could not be recovered to be compared with, for example, the ridge track of the tyres on the vehicle recovered?

02 Nov 11:44

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MS: Are you saying the GPS reading of that waypoint, correlates with the reading you took at the crime scene?

PB: It corresponds as far as it is in the same location, there are small decimal points that it differs but it is the same location.

02 Nov 11:43

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PB: It is also the area where I noticed the reverse of the tyre, which is consistent of a vehicle making a U-turn.

02 Nov 11:42

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PB: At 07:11.04, waypoint logged at entrace to dirt road at cattle grid.

Arrow turns up dirt road.

PB: Journey ended at 07:13:10 with an ignition off. A waypoint was recorded at 07:12:32, at one of the fixed points that I recorded. At this stage this was just before the ignition was turned off. This correlates with point A2 on the crime scene photo, which is the end of the vehicle tyre track found at the crime scene.

02 Nov 11:39

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MS: At the crime scene itself, were you able to do the same exercise?

PB calls up new map, shows bush area near Kwanobuhle.

PB: The journey is marked out in blue, is still part of one continuous journey that started in Kwanobuhle without any ignition off. This journey starts at 07:10:40.

Animation shows arrow moving slowly along the screen.

PB: It is going to take slightly longer, but I don't want to change the speed in correlation to the previous slides.Arrow now halfway across screen.

02 Nov 11:38

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PB: I must qualify, the points plotted as the data was received is definitely off the road, but the data is only as accurate as the device itself.

MS: Would I be correct, the one point is 6.28.58 - the first point that is off the road?

PB: Yes

MS: And the next is 6.29.19?

PB: Yes

MS: And after that the vehicle returns to the road?

PB: Yes

02 Nov 11:37

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TP: I want to check something, he said possibly, now it has been put to him that it did.

02 Nov 11:35

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MS: So the vehicle veered off the road?

PB: Yes

MS: Before returning to the main road?

PB: Yes

02 Nov 11:34

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MS: Can you explain the diversion?

PB: This is situated at point C, where the gate is.

The distance indicates the vehicle was possibly off the tar road itself... if we look at the driveway in front of the gate.

02 Nov 11:32

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PB calls up new map. This short section deals with from 6.28 to 6.29.

Animation shows vehicle diverting off the main road.

02 Nov 11:32

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MS: From 6.28.36, is it possible for you to bring us even closer to point C (the Deacon Road entrance to complex)

02 Nov 11:31

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PB: This whole journey was from 06:04.33 am on the 21st of April, until 6:28.36 am.

This was not ignition on, ignition off, this is was a full trip which started from Kwanobuhle earlier in the morning,

02 Nov 11:29

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PB: The approximate speed at which the arrow travels is also the approximate speed at which the vehicle would have travelled.

All eyes are on the screen. Court is silent

PB: As you can see the arrow speeds up when in Deacon road.

The arrow shows the vehicle doing multiple loops around the townhouse complex.

02 Nov 11:26

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PB is showing the slide and how the software works.

02 Nov 11:24

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PB: The difference between what is on the screen and what was handed in yesterday is that yesterday's were fixed points.

Today I am going to use software to do a live animation of the route in the time frame that has been requested from me.

02 Nov 11:23

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MS: Ok, I want to go back to the trip maps and take you back to the 21st of April, the early hours of the morning.

That specific visit in the Deacon Road area (Deacon road is the street that the Stellen Gen townhouse is based.)

What we have done is that we have all these points marked out on the screen, is it possible to show how the vehicle moved that morning.

I am only interested in how the vehicle moved in deacon road.

02 Nov 11:22

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PB goes through the serial numbers of exhibits.

02 Nov 11:22

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MS: Before we continue WO Bekker, can we just go back to the biological exhibits.

02 Nov 11:22

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Bekker is sworn in.

02 Nov 11:21

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MS: I would like to thank the court for its patience.

I wish to place it on record that between myself and the defence council we have sorted out a number of logistical issues relating to the case going forward.

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